IKEA Founder Ingvar Kamprad Dies At 91

STOCKHOLM: IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad, who constructed a worldwide enterprise empire with revolutionary flat-pack furnishings and was recognized for his contempt for taxes, died aged 91, the Swedish furnishing big stated on Sunday.
The corporate stated in a press release that Kamprad “handed away peacefully surrounded by his family members” at his dwelling within the southern Swedish area of Smaland on Saturday “following a short sickness”.

“His legacy can be admired for a few years to come back and his imaginative and prescient – to create a greater on a regular basis life for the many individuals – will proceed to information and encourage us,” Jesper Brodin, CEO and president of the Ikea Group, stated within the assertion.
Born in 1926 to a farming household within the southern Swedish area of Smaland, Kamprad based the corporate at age 17.
Regardless of his monumental success and wealth, Kamprad’s modest spending habits bordered on the obsessive.

The founding father of IKEA and one of many best entrepreneurs of the 20th century, Ingvar Kamprad, has handed away on the age of 91. pic.twitter.com/DxyALH1LQ9- IKEA In the present day (@IKEAtoday) January 28, 2018

In 1973 he fled Sweden’s greater tax construction for Denmark earlier than looking for even decrease taxes in Switzerland.
Beginning in 2010 Kamprad steadily made approach on the helm of the corporate for his three sons, lastly returning to dwell in Sweden in 2014.

Kamprad introduced in 2013 that he can be stepping down from the board of Inter Ikea, proprietor of the furnishings big’s idea and model, and his youngest son grew to become chairman.
The Consortium of Investigative Journalists in 2014 cited leaked tax information from Luxembourg when it recognized Ikea as one of many big multinationals fingered for company tax avoidance by shuffling cash to tax havens.
Final yr, the European Fee introduced that it had launched an investigation into Ikea’s tax offers within the Netherlands.
The group insists that it complies totally with nationwide and worldwide tax laws.

Kamprad was additionally recognized for his ties to the Swedish Nazi celebration throughout his early days.
Sweden was impartial in World Battle II, and its Nazi celebration remained lively after 1945. The Ikea founder stated he stopped attending its conferences in 1948.